Boy, are we happy to see September roll around!
Boxing is back, relaxed, recharged, glowing with a bronzed tan, ready to accelerate down the back stretch of 2025 with a run of huge fights.
Consider this weekend the hors d’oeuvre before next weekend’s main course of Canelo vs. Crawford and Inoue vs. Akhmadaliev — still tasty enough, but leaving you wanting more.
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Let’s take a look at the weekend’s action, starting with a “Sugar” rush in Mexico and finishing up with a fighting fiesta in Liverpool.
‘Sugar’ Nunez looking for sweet Mexican return
Speak to Matchroom Boxing’s Eddie Hearn, and it won’t be long until the name Eduardo “Sugar” Nunez (28-1, 27 KOs) comes out of his mouth.
Hearn has developed a recent love affair with the hard-hitting 28-year-old Mexican, and is looking to skyrocket the IBF super featherweight champion into stardom in front of his own people.
Hearn takes “Sugar” back to his home town of Los Mochis, Sinaloa, Mexico this Saturday night on DAZN, defending his 130 pounds title against the experienced Christopher Diaz-Velez (30-5, 19 KOs), with a rowdy, raucous, rambunctious — insert another word beginning with R — atmosphere expected.
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The world title contest lands inside the CUM Los Mochis — no sniggering at the back, please — otherwise known as the Centro de Usos Múltiples, where local basketball team Pioneros de Los Mochis regularly play in front of a 5,800 capacity.
Lamont Roach Jr. (25-1-2, 10 KOs), O’Shaquie Foster (23-3, 12 KOs) and Emanuel Navarrete (39-2-1, 32 KOs) are the other beltholders in a 130-pound division that Hearn and Nunez are targeting to dominate. All four champions offer something completely different and are a big win away from arguing their corner to top the division’s rankings.
“I know I still have a long way to go, we’re just getting started.” Nunez told the assembled press ahead of his latest outing. “I’m about to make my first defense. My goal is to be an idol.”
The stage is set for Nunez. With some powerful voices fighting his corner, his ceiling is limitless.
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How much does Michael Conlan have left to give boxing?
There were some interesting noises coming out of Michael Conlan (19-3, 9 KOs) in the buildup to his Dublin return.
The 33-year-old has taken a que será approach to his final few years as a professional boxer, claiming to have limited love left for the sport that has defined his life.
“It’s not a sport that I believe you can love because it’s never a sport that will love you back,” he told Boxing Scene this week, underlining the inner conflict he endures every time he laces up a pair of boxing gloves.
Conlan challenges Yorkshire’s Jack Bateson (20-1-1, 6 KOs) for the IBF’s vacant International title at featherweight this Friday night — likely live as you read this — in what feels like a swan song event.
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The Irishman has run 3-3 in his last six outings, dropping TKO losses to the likes of Leigh Wood, Luis Alberto Lopez and Jordan Gill, and a scholar of the sport like Conlan should understand that there are rarely fairytale endings in boxing.
Jack Bateson is a hungry and, compared to Conlan, fresh contender, who despite not owning that knockout power, will believe he has the tools to push Conlan into retirement. An impressive amateur himself, Bateson hasn’t been given the same push that others have on the world scene — such is the business of boxing — so Friday night offers that opportunity for him to finally break out.
Pat McCormack to avoid Matchroom’s Mexican mishap?
Matchroom prospects and Mexican mishaps go hand-in-hand like peanut butter and jelly, salt and pepper, Chelsea Football Club and winning trophies.
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But this relationship isn’t necessarily a harmonious one.
On more than one occasion, Matchroom’s Eddie Hearn has been seen ringside with his head in his hands following another one of his charges losing to a relatively unknown Mexican.
Well, “Fool me once, shame on you,” etc.
Hearn is once again rolling the dice, this time with his fresh-faced Olympian, Pat McCormack (7-0, 5 KOs), who steps into his eighth pro fight against the hardened Miguel Parra (25-5-1, 17 KOs) on Saturday night in the northeast of England.
McCormack has been left frustrated due to injury and inactivity over the past couple of years, but a win over Parra will force the conversations to begin for British and European opportunities at welterweight.
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Parra said in the final press conference that he “is going to enjoy this fight” and “hope to do his best” — hardly a rabble-rousing statement of intent, but perhaps this is a case of yet another traveling underdog playing possum.
Pat McCormack (left) and Miguel Parra pose during their weigh-in ahead of their WBA Intercontinental welterweight title fight in Newcastle upon Tyne, England.
(Mark Robinson via Getty Images)
Pedro Guevara and Adrian Curiel light up Sinaloa
If you want to put your chips on an under-the-radar banger for this weekend, then look no further than Pedro Guevara (43-5-1, 22 KOs) vs. Adrian Curiel (26-6-1, 5 KOs).
Ten years separate these pair of seasoned Mexican super flyweights, but we’re not expecting to see a massive gulf between them on Saturday as they act as co-main event to “Sugar” Nunez’s homecoming.
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Guevara’s losses have come to the best of the best across the lower weights, most recently a third-round TKO at the heavy hands of Jesse “Bam” Rodriguez. He bounced back with a win in March earlier this year, but will be kept busy by the fresher Curiel, who was a world champion just 18 months ago before losing his strap in a rematch to the man he bested the first time around: Sivenathi Nontshinga (13-2, 10 KOs).
The bookmakers have Guevara as the slight favorite in this one, but no result would be a shock in a fight that will surely catch fire.
The inaugural World Boxing Championships kick off in Liverpool
If you happen to find yourself in Liverpool, England this weekend — or into next week — cancel your booking at The Beatles museum and head to the M&S Bank Arena for the World Boxing Championships.
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Five hundred eighty boxers from nearly 70 countries will compete over the course of 11 days, as the new global governing body, World Boxing, allows us a peek into the future of how the amateur game will look under their control.
It’s a high-pressure dress rehearsal for Los Angeles 2028, where boxing will once again feature in the Summer Olympics after overcoming serious doubts over the sport’s future in the Games.
The World Boxing Championships is being live-streamed on World Boxing’s website via Eurovision Sport (available in selected territories), so get involved!
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